Page 39 of 41

Posted on

Blog Depression in Fourteen Million

Do blogs create democracy and foment The Citizen Journalist?

Or are all bloggers just begging the wind?

Here are some sobering numbers reported on The McLaughlin Group over the weekend:

  • 140,000 new blogs started each day
  • One blog is created every second
  • 14 million new blogs are started a year

Is there a point to blogging any longer or will the little people with the small — but important — voices be drowned out by the traditional Big Media sites who will suck all the bandwidth and chew up all the pertinent search returns?

Is the Golden Age of Blogging now dead?

Posted on

Swollen Hands at the Feet of Opportunity

Have you ever typed so much for so long in high heat that your hands started to swell?

My hands have been swollen for over 24 hours now and I can’t figure out how to get the blood out of my fingertips.

I’ve tried icing, exercise, water pills and push-ups.

Nothing helps.  The hands remain swollen and the fingers are unbendable.

Still, we solider on, and continue — as evidenced in this post.

Posted on

Memory or Meme or Me?

Which comes first:  The Memory or the Meme or Me?

The meme — the invisible sharing of knowledge — comes before the memory.  The exchange of thoughts and ideas creates the expectation of moments and the living makes the shared memory.

Continue reading → Memory or Meme or Me?

Posted on

Hey from Hi and Other Colloquial Quirks

When, exactly, did “Hey!” replace “Hi!” as a standard greeting?

I think I’ve been using “Hey!” for “Hi!” for at least five years — but I’m not sure of the when or why.

Was there some sea change in a cultural colloquialism I missed?

Posted on

Royalty Advances and the Uncertain Author

Book royalties from computer book publishers to authors have precipitously diminished over the last decade and so have “cash advances” against those future royalties.

Ten years ago, a first time author could expect to get at least a $15,000.00 USD advance against royalties with royalties starting at 8% and rising to 12% or even 15%.

Continue reading → Royalty Advances and the Uncertain Author

Posted on

Beauty and Gore

Recent movies such as 300 and The Hitcher prove there is a written disconnect between aesthetic, the body, and gore as expressed in the higher calling of community welfare and the darkest depths effervescent commodity.

One film proves there is humanity and purpose in bloodshed while the other confirms we lose our hearts in the unnecessary testimony of individual cruelty rioting in rivulets of blood across the screen.

What causes one mind to write such beauty in dismay, while another pens purgatory for profit?

Posted on

Inevitable Us and the United We

The world requires us.

We are inevitable.

We become not what we want — but what others desire of us.

If were were unnecessary, we would not be here.

What, then, do we do with this complicated life when the risk of throwing it away outweighs the rewards of righteousness?

Posted on

Web Cruelty 2.0 and the Myth of Kindness

I’ve written a lot about how cruelty has ruined Web 2.0:

Hate Mail and Spam
Why Do You Hide Your Identity?
Impulsive Web Rage
Anti-Social Networking
Sycophants in Rejection: Making Terroristic Threats

Continue reading → Web Cruelty 2.0 and the Myth of Kindness

Posted on

Textual Semiotic and the Word as Image

I run another blog called Urban Semiotic and over there we look at issues rotting the urban core.

This WordPunk blog concerns writing about words in the wilds. 

We are textual. 

We are not the image.

Is it possible for text to be semiotic?

WordPunk Logo Single Line

Or is the word always text — even as an image?

Posted on

TypePad Value

After my free TypePad trial, I have decided to stick with “paying my way” blogging so I can continue to watch TypePad grow its features set in comparison with my ongoing experience with both Blogger and WordPress.

TypePad’s support folk are kind and responsive and that is important when you have a dire question or when you blog dies — and the inevitable truth of all life on the web is that everything eventually dies — sometimes things are reborn anew, but many times things stay dead without direct resuscitation.